Aromatics are important fundamental raw materials for petrochemical industry, which are widely used in the fields of polyester, chemical fiber, rubber and the like. Benzene, toluene, and xylene are the three most widely used aromatics, which are generalized as light aromatics or BTX aromatics. Currently, the worldwide aromatic production depends mainly on the non-renewable fossil resource, whilst the production cost of aromatics is more and more increased due to the limited reserve and non-renewability of the fossil resource. In addition, the increasing exploitation and utilization of fossil resource result in abundant discharge of greenhouse gases, leading to more and more severe environmental problems. Therefore, developing the technique of producing aromatics (especially BTX aromatics) from renewable resources is of importance.
As renewable resources, production of aromatics using a biomass material as raw material is one of the most interested technical projects currently. There are reports about converting biomass material into aromatics, and also reports about platform compounds useful thereof (e.g., see Katherine Bourzac, From biomass to chemicals in one step, MIT Technology Review, 2010 March 29; CN104230615A; US20090227823 and US20110257416A1).
However, the general defect of the prior arts is a relatively low carbon availability during the conversion from biomass material to aromatics, which demonstrates poor utilization efficiency of biomass, resulting in a relatively low yield of carbon for the aromatics (especially BTX aromatics).